The present invention relates to a mattress, particularly to an air mattress or the like comprising a number of adjacent, elongate bag-like elements which can be filled with gas such as air, or with some other flowing medium, and which elements are arranged transversally with respect to the longitudinal axis of the mattress.
The invention also relates to a method for adjusting the mattress, particularly an air mattress.
A serious problem in modern nursing is to create a bed environment which causes as little trouble and inconvenience to the patient as possible, and where various tasks connected to the patient's care can be carried out, such as cleaning and washing. Particularly patients who are confined to bed for a long time or permanently, and cannot turn or move their limbs themselves, inevitably get bedsores when lying on ordinary beds and mattresses. The bedsores make the regular care of the patient even more difficult, and serve, among others, as entry routes for various infections. Bedsores are created in places where the surface pressure against the skin is continuously higher than 35-50 cm H.sub.2 O. These patients must therefore be turned, or their position changed, every two or three hours by nurses. However, the moving or turning of for instance multihandicapped patients may in practice be impossible.
In the prior art there are known air mattresses compiled of separate elements, and other corresponding soft beddings, some of these being introduced for instance in the U.S. Pat. No. 3,192,540 and in the GB patent publications 1,545,806 and 2,141,333.
The U.S. Pat. No. 3,192,540 discloses a pneumatic seat cushion composed of adjacent, elongate compartments, which are inflatable with some pressurized medium such as pressure air. The compartments are separate but connected to each other. They are filled with air up to a desired pressure, whereafter the filler pipe is cut off. Now the compartments rest adjacently against a straight board, and are hemispherical in cross-section. This seat cushion structure is not sufficiently resilient and solid in order to effectively conform to the forms of the human body, so that it would provide a firm support at the same time. Moreover, the structure is unstable and does not prevent so-called bottom contacts, i.e. the surface layer is at times pressed against the bottom owing to the weight loaded on the mattress.
The British patent application 2,141,333 introduces an air mattress composed of separate, adjacently installed air sacs which are interconnected by means of air ducts. The sacs are arranged inside a bed frame structure, transversally with respect to the longitudinal direction of the bed. In addition to this, the sacs are divided into five groups, and each of these groups is connected to the air supply device by means of a separate conduit. This type of mattress requires a special frame structure, whereto the air supply device is also connected as an independent unit. A corresponding mattress suggestion is introduced in the British patent publication 1,545,806.
The mattress and bed structures introduced in the above mentioned patent publications GB 1,545,806 and GB 2,141,333 are designed particularly for hospital environments. In these examples, the air mattress and the bed frame form an inseparable entity. They are complex in structure and expensive to manufacture, and consequently by no means suited to be used as regular mattresses in ordinary homes.